January 7, 2026

With the US attack on Venezuela, Gaza and Ukraine have moved down the global agenda. Previously, there was a seesaw relationship between the two. When violence or “peace efforts” in one attracted attention, the other faded into the background. During the past week, they were hardly mentioned. Yet they are still with us, and the world does not need new reminders.

His meeting with President Trump, at Mar-a-Lago on December 29, gave Prime Minister Netanyahu yet another opportunity to highlight the US President’s total support for him, defined as a partnership “second to none.” Both leaders heaped praise on each other. This was important for Netanyahu as Israel enters an election year.

President Trump unveiled his 20-point Gaza peace plan at the White House on September 9, 2025, alongside Netanyahu.[i] Their last meeting was supposed to shed some light on the “second phase” of the plan. However, the two leaders said little on the prospect of a lasting ceasefire. During remarks to the press, Netanyahu said, “Sometimes we have different ideas, but we work it out. And most of the time, we see eye to eye.”[ii]

In response to a question, Trump said,  “Israel has lived up to the plan, 100 percent.”

Yet, on December 24, a New York Times article titled, “The Truce Is 2 Months Old. So Why Have Hundreds of Gazans Been Killed?” started with the following:

“The cease-fire in Gaza is more than two months old. But the killing of Palestinians has not yet stopped for more than a day or two at a time. Death can come from straying across the Yellow Line, the poorly demarcated border between eastern Gaza, where the Israeli military has entrenched itself, and the western half, where Hamas is seeking to reestablish control over Gaza’s two million-plus residents. Dozens of times since the truce went into effect on Oct. 10, Palestinians have been killed for crossing east, knowingly or not.”

Trump said Hamas will be given a very short period of time to disarm. As for Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, he said, “Well, that’s a separate subject. We’ll talk about that.”

Paragraph 12 of Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan says: “No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return. We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza.”

Earlier in December, Israel’s Defense Minister Katz had said that Israel would “never leave” the Gaza Strip and would resettle the northern part of the enclave, although he soon walked back on his remarks.

When Trump was asked, on December 29, about a recent poll showing that as many as half of Gazans would be willing to leave the Gaza Strip if given the opportunity. His response made clear that he remains more than open to the idea.

On December 24, 2025, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, the United Kingdom, and Germany condemned the Israeli security cabinet’s approval of 19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank. Thus, it came as no surprise when President Trump was asked about settler violence in the West Bank.

In an interview on the Gaza ceasefire with TIME, on October 15, 2025, when asked about Israel’s possible annexation of the West  Bank, President Trump had said, “… you can’t do that now. We’ve had great Arab support. It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries. It will not happen. Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.”

This time, together with Netanyahu, he said, “Well, we have had a discussion, a big discussion, for a long time on the West Bank. And I wouldn’t say we agree on the West Bank 100 percent. But we will come to a conclusion on the West Bank.”

Reportedly, Trump and his top aides expressed concern over Israel’s West Bank policies at Mar-a-Lago.

In a post in August 2025, I summarized  my outlook for the future as follows:

“With new settlement projects in the West Bank and now Israel’s major offensive against Gaza, it is abundantly clear that Prime Minister Netanyahu’s goal is to push the Gazans to a tiny sliver of the Strip in the south, send the West Bank Palestinians there also, persuade Egypt to cede another sliver of land beyond the Rafah crossing, and then turn to the proponents of the “two-state solution” and tell them, “There it is, your State of Palestine.”

Netanyahu will seek re-election this year. If he succeeds, which I believe is likely, this could be his last term in office. As someone determined to make history, he would not give up on annexing the West Bank and the larger part of the Gaza enclave. To be honest, no major or regional power would decisively intervene to prevent it.

Following the abduction of President Maduro, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu congratulated Trump on his “bold and historic leadership on behalf of freedom and justice.” No doubt, the attack on Venezuela will encourage Netanyahu to advance his plans for the West Bank and beyond.

At present, Washington appears to be focusing on the Western Hemisphere, with threats to Colombia, Cuba, and Mexico. However, the next target may well again be Iran for another display of “American military might”, to use President Trump’s words.

For me, as a Turk, the most striking comments by President Trump, while Netanyahu listened, were his answers to questions about an Israel-Türkiye confrontation. After mentioning that President Erdoğan has done a fantastic job, that he is with him and with Bibi all the way, and nothing (worrying) is going to happen, he said:

“And don’t forget, it was President Erdogan helped very much get rid of a very bad ruler of Syria. That was President Erdogan. And he never wanted the credit for it, but he really gets a lot of credit. Bibi agrees with that. I agree with I mean, I know it. And President Erdogan should get a lot of good credit for what he did. He got rid of some very bad people. And, you know, they’ve been wanting to do that for a thousand years with different names, but for a thousand years in Syria, President Erdogan did it. And we give him a lot of credit. I give him a lot of credit. But I think it’s going to work out well between Syria and Israel…”

On December 14, 1981, Israel annexed the occupied Syrian Golan Heights and asserted its perpetual sovereignty over the territory it captured in the 1967 Middle East war. On December 7, 2024, when the Assad regime was about to collapse, Israeli forces entered the demilitarized buffer zone. In the aftermath of Assad’s overthrow, Israel launched hundreds of strikes on Syria targeting strategic military sites.

The effectiveness of the mechanism agreed upon in Paris yesterday between the US, Israel, and Syria to address disputes promptly and prevent misunderstandings remains to be seen.[iii] 

In brief, President Erdoğan did a great favor to Israel and Netanyahu by cooperating with Israel and the US in the ouster of President Assad. Consequently, the Israeli Prime Minister must distinguish between Ankara’s words and deeds. He must learn, like us in Türkiye, to judge things not by what he hears but by what he sees.

The history of the Golan Heights, Syrian territory until 1967, sends many signals about what is likely to follow in the West Bank and Gaza, particularly “Judea and Samaria”, which many Israelis consider their ancestral homeland.

The US National Security Strategy says, “But the days in which the Middle East dominated American foreign policy in both long-term planning and day-to-day execution are thankfully over—not because the Middle East no longer matters, but because it is no longer the constant irritant, and potential source of imminent catastrophe, that it once was. It is rather emerging as a place of partnership, friendship, and investment—a trend that should be welcomed and encouraged.”

Recently, Trump again said, “And a lot of good things are happening in the Middle East. We have peace in the Middle East, and we’re going to try and keep it that way.”

Yet, a New York Times article titled “Zero Hour for the Middle East” said, “For more than a decade, war has ravaged the Middle East.  From Syria to Lebanon, Israel to Gaza, hundreds of thousands have been killed or wounded. After so much bloodletting, the region now stands at a crossroads.” And the authors then asked, “ Will it persist in conflict, or forge a brighter future?”[iv]

Unfortunately, with a fragile ceasefire in Gaza, uncertainties about Iran’s nuclear program, Syria’s continuing instability, growing tensions between Saudi Arabia and the UAE over Yemen, and now the US raid into Venezuela, even the start of the new year does not inspire much optimism.

Nonetheless, on New Year’s Day, the BBC reported that “countries around the world celebrated the new year with colorful shows and long-held traditions.”

In Türkiye, under authoritarian rule with a declining economy, all we could say was, “Bonjour tristesse…”

[i] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c70155nked7o

[ii] https://singjupost.com/transcript-president-trump-pm-netanyahu-joint-press-briefing-mar-a-lago/

[iii] https://www.state.gov/releases/office-of-the-spokesperson/2026/01/joint-statement-on-the-trilateral-meeting-between-the-governments-of-the-united-states-of-america-the-state-of-israel-and-the-syrian-arab-republic/

[iv] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/28/world/middleeast/future-of-mideast.html?smid=em-share